Today, at a press conference in Paris and Chicago, Google announced the major global expansion of last year’s groundbreaking Art Project. This unique collaboration merging art and technology now includes 151 partners in 40 countries around the world. In the United States alone, the project has expanded beyond the initial group of four museums, which included The Frick Collection, to represent 29 partners—ranging from large institutions to university galleries—in 16 cities. Additionally, significant technical improvements have been made to the site that resulted in a higher quality display of the virtual tour, the enhanced browsing of content, and the integration of Google+ and video hangouts, allowing visitors to create and share engaging personal galleries. The expanded global partnership can be explored at googleartproject.com.
With just a click of a mouse, the expanded site now allows the public to explore more than 30,000 works of art, including paintings, sculpture, decorative arts, and photographs, as well as street art and culturally significant sites around the world. The site also provides virtual access to 46 museums via Street View
technology. Comments Ian Wardropper, Director of The Frick Collection, “We were deeply honored to be included in the initial group of international museums to launch the Art Project in 2011. This expanded version of the site allows us to represent the Frick’s strong holdings in the areas of decorative arts and
sculpture as well as the newest addition to our famed house-museum, the Portico Gallery, through an updated virtual tour. Additionally, our participation in the project coincides with a dramatic increase in our own interactive Web content, and we are thrilled that through this collaboration our offerings will be enjoyed by a larger audience.”